


Folivory

by LittleQueenTrashMouth



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Aang Week 2021, F/M, Gen, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-18 22:36:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29616489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleQueenTrashMouth/pseuds/LittleQueenTrashMouth
Summary: Momo’s mysterious illness leads Aang to a new discovery about the flying lemurs.****For Aang Week 2021 Day 1: Laughter/Joy
Relationships: Aang/Katara (Avatar)
Comments: 12
Kudos: 47
Collections: Non-Ship Fics of AtLA





	Folivory

**Author's Note:**

> IT’S AANG WEEK! The best week for the best boy! I’m kicking off the holiday with the Day 1 Prompt, which is: Laughter/Joy. This takes place a few years after the end of the war.

There was something wrong with Momo.

It had started a few weeks earlier, when he had abruptly become three times as ravenous as usual. Aang and Katara had chuckled over the winged lemur digging through their food stores, chittering angrily at being denied extra rations. He had taken to eating every insect and seed he found on the ground, and even began pulling up grass to eat. At first, Aang had sternly told him off, but finally relented when Momo’s plaintive screeching throughout the night made it impossible for them to sleep. Surely there was nothing wrong with giving Momo an extra apple or two per day.

More recently, Aang had begun to actually be concerned. The lemur alternated between overwhelming affection, refusing to leave his shoulder and aggressively licking his head, and hostility. Sometimes Momo disappeared for the entire day, and when he returned he spat and hissed at both Aang and Katara. He was stealing things, scraps of cloth and socks, and hiding them throughout Appa’s saddle or disappearing with them all together. Despite the extra food, the lemur seemed to grow scrawny everywhere except his belly, which was now swollen and tight.

“Do you think he’s sick? Maybe he picked up a parasite somewhere,” Aang anxiously babbled as Katara ran a globe of glowing water along the lemur’s body. They were in their room at the guest house in the village they had been staying in for the past month. Hanam had previously been occupied by the Fire Nation due to its proximity to a gold mine, and Aang had offered to help with restoring their infrastructure. “I gave him that kind of iffy mango, maybe he has food poisoning. Or—”

“Aang, I’m trying to concentrate,” Katara interrupted him, firm without reprimand. Aang snapped his mouth shut, his eyes tracing Katara’s hands as she moved the water from Momo’s arm, to his chest, to his distended stomach. She froze.

“What is it? Is something wrong?” Aang was almost in tears at the thought that Momo, _his_ Momo, could be sick or hurt.

“How do you know Momo is a male lemur?” Katara asked. The question, seemingly out of the blue, threw off Aang.

“Oh, I don’t know. Both male and female lemurs look the same, I guess I just assumed. Why?”

“Because,” Katara returned the water to the pouch at her hip, giving Aang a reassuring smile. “Momo is pregnant.”

The words took a moment to sink in. “Pregnant?”

“Yep. He—well, I guess, _she_ —is perfectly healthy otherwise. We could probably give him—her—more food every day, if she wants it.”

Aang was sitting on the ground, though he didn’t remember making the move to do so. He put his head in his hands, his brain whirring. “But…if Momo is pregnant…” He found he couldn’t say the words out loud. It hurt too much, to have that much hope.

“There are more flying lemurs,” Katara finished, grinning broadly.

* * *

“Aang, you have to go to sleep.”

“No.” Aang hunched his shoulders, clasping his arms around his folded knees. His red-rimmed eyes were trained on Momo, who was curled up under the window. He hadn’t let the lemur out of his sight since finding out about her pregnancy earlier that afternoon. From what he remembered of the flying lemurs, both parents would work together to raise the pups. Aang assumed that Momo’s long absences were her flying out to meet her mate, and it was likely she would go out to meet him again. He intended to follow her.

Unfortunately, after her examination, Momo had lazed around the backyard of the house they were staying at, alternating between sleeping in the shade and grooming. As the sun set, Momo crept back into their room to continue sleeping, with no indication that she planned to go anywhere. Aang was exhausted, despairing, but he refused to rest. Not until he found the other lemurs.

Katara sighed, but instead of going back to bed, sat down on the ground next to him. She leaned against his side, and he obligingly lifted up one arm to wrap around her. “What were the flying lemurs like?” she murmured, snuggling her head against his shoulder. “Before you were frozen.”

“Hundreds of them, even thousands,” Aang responded, in that dreamy way that he always spoke about the air temples of old. “They were...not sacred, but respected. The legends say that the Air Nomads learned airbending from the sky bison, but the lemurs taught us how to make our gliders and use them to fly.” 

The arm around Katara tightened. “Keep going,” she prompted him, placing one comforting hand against his chest. With a heavy sigh, Aang did so.

“They were so smart, and so funny. We couldn’t leave anything outside without the lemurs trying to steal it, or eat it.” Aang chuckled at the memory. “We used to go out and fly with them. They weren’t afraid of us at all. It was like they knew we wouldn’t hurt them. They were really social too. They’d sleep in big groups, all piled together.” Aang’s hand stalled in the air, wanting to pet Momo, but not wanting to disturb her. “I’ve always wondered if she’s lonely, being the only lemur left.”

“She’s not the only one,” Katara reminded him. “Even if we don’t find the lemur that impregnated her, she’s going to have her babies with us.”

Aang smiled, bending down to kiss the top of her head. “You’re right. Thank you.”

“You’re still not going to sleep, are you?”

“Nope.”

* * *

It was dawn before Momo began to stir. Katara had long since dozed off against him. Aang somehow remained awake, sitting on the floor, watching. Momo shifted, stretching out her front paws and arching her back. Then, without warning, she jumped up and clambered out the window.

“Katara, she’s leaving!” Aang shouted, leaping to his feet. Katara fell to the ground with a grunt, but before she could complain he was out the door, grabbing his glider. He hurtled himself into the air, racing after the rapidly receding dot that was his lemur.

At first, Aang feared that Momo would try to outfly him, or get startled and change course. To his relief, Momo kept up a slow and steady pace, aiming unerringly towards the nearby mountain. It was soon clear that Momo was heading towards the peak of the mountain. As they gained elevation, Aang had the thought that the area reminded him of the mountains at the air temples. The plants were similar, the climate was similar, and the way the thin air seemed to both exhaust and revitalize him was similar. The little spark of hope that had been flickering in Aang’s chest burst to life. If there were going to be flying lemurs _anywhere_ , it would be here, hiding safe in the highest reaches of the mountain.

Momo ducked and turned, alighting on one of the top branches of a tree. Aang landed on the next tree over, folding up his glider as quietly as possible. For a minute, there was silence. Momo seemed unbothered by the stillness; she was licking her front paws and drawing them over her face to clean it.

Then the leaves in the tree rustled, and from them emerged a flying lemur.

Aang clapped one hand over his mouth to stifle his yelp, and tears sprang unbidden to his eyes. The first lemur was followed by another, then another, until about a dozen lemurs were sitting on the branch with Momo. One of them sat right beside her, and began licking the side of her head.

Unable to contain himself, Aang hopped over to the lemur-filled branch. The air was filled with the sound of rustling wings and startled squeaks as the lemurs dispersed back into the forest. Soon, only Momo was left on the branch, tilting her head in confusion.

“It’s okay,” Aang said softly, settling down to wait on the branch. “It’s okay. I’m a friend.”

A combination of Aang’s stillness and Momo’s comfort with him seemed to assuage the other lemurs, and they slowly returned from their hiding places. They inched closer and closer to him, chittering among themselves. Bored, Momo climbed into his lap and began searching through his robes for food. That was enough for the wild lemurs, and soon he had tiny hands prodding at his arms, going through his clothing, scampering up his back. Aang laughed, and the lemurs started, but didn’t run away this time. The tears were flowing freely now, and Aang did nothing to hold them back. A tightness that he had been holding inside of him, the knowledge that him and his two animal companions were the last remaining vestiges of the Air Nomads, had loosened. Somehow, another part of the temples had survived. 

One of the lemurs suddenly swooped off the branch, taking off into the early morning air. The others followed suit, including Momo. Aang peered between the leaves to see that the lemurs were not actually going anywhere, simply wheeling and circling in the sky. With a loud whoop, Aang snatched his glider and sprang into the air to join them. For the first time in over a hundred years, an airbender flew with a flock of flying lemurs. Aang was smiling so wide that his face hurt, joyous laughter bubbling out of him. The lemurs seemed to join him in their own, chattering language.

* * *

Using the lychee nuts that Aang always had on his person, he managed to coax the remaining lemurs into following him back to Hanam. The sight of Appa bounding towards them when he saw the small flock got Aang crying all over again. After they concluded their business in the Earth Kingdom, Katara and Aang brought the flying lemurs back to the Southern Air Temple. They rapidly spread out across their new home, except for Momo and her mate, which Aang had named Yuzu. 

Two months later, Momo gave birth to four tiny, perfect pups. Aang cradled one of the babies in his hand, giggling as it wrapped it’s paws around his thumb and began gnawing on it. He returned the pup to Momo, who was nursing the other babies. They would stay in the Southern Air Temple until the pups were weaned, then they would move on. Aang would continue his Avatar duties, but he had another mission now. The Earth Kingdom was filled with mountains, and the lemurs could be found, if you were looking.

And now, Aang was looking.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed! Come say hi to me on tumblr at [@praetorqueenreyna](https://praetorqueenreyna.tumblr.com/).


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